To Stars members and fans,
It's a massive privilege to step into the role as General Manager at this special club, especially at such an exciting time for cricket and the Big Bash Leagues.
This great responsibility follows 10 years of working in the global game across six ICC World Cups, Cricket Australia and Hong Kong Cricket. I want to bring that experience and the relationships from across the cricket ecosystem to achieve more on field success and positive community impact at the Melbourne Stars.
What is immediately obvious is the tremendous passion for the Stars from the members and fans, staff, players, and our commercial partners, which makes it an exciting place to come into work every day.
Although it is the off-season, there is plenty happening at this time of year as we solidify our coaching and playing rosters in both our WBBL and BBL teams.
We will be taking some great momentum into BBL|15 after such an exhilarating finish to last season. The unanimous feedback from the playing group and coaching staff is that a special camaraderie developed and that’s one of the reasons we’ve re-signed Head Coach Peter Moores for a further two seasons. You don’t turn around a 0-5 start without great leadership, so we’ve got a lot of confidence in Peter to build on last year’s foundation.
I truly believe we can contend for the title next season, so while the fixtures haven’t been released yet, I hope all our fans are getting ready to save the date for Opening Night at the ‘G in December. We need you to set the tone for BBL|15!
In the WBBL, we’ve appointed Andy Christie as our new Head Coach. Andy is the current Victorian Women’s coach, which means he will be working with a number of our players throughout the whole year. We have a core group of exciting young Victorian talent in the squad and we felt this was the best way to fast track their development. Obviously, the results were not what the club expected last season but from speaking with Annabel Sutherland and Meg Lanning over recent weeks I can see a great determination to turn that around.
The overseas draft is also just around the corner on June 19. We’re hearing that there will be some world class players nominating in both WBBL and BBL. Our High Performance Manager Clint McKay, our analyst Tim Kendrew along with the coaches are working really hard to analyse a number of players to see what the best fit for us will be across both teams. On the BBL side, we have pick number seven, meaning we will need to be agile with what selections occur in front of us, while we have a little more certainty at WBBL with pick three. The draft will air on Channel 7 at 4pm– so tune in to see it all unfold.
We have also finalised a few key domestic signings as well, which we will share with you all ahead of the draft. Stay tuned to our Stars social channels over the coming days!
In terms of off-field planning, the team are working really hard to make this season the biggest on record in terms of attendance. We’ve seen some fantastic growth in our crowds over recent seasons that have laid a platform for us to take it to another level in what will be a big Ashes summer for cricket.
I want to thank all of our members and fans, who are the heartbeat of the club. We want you to feel part of what we do, so if you have thoughts or ideas on how we can improve, please email mabbott@melbournestars.com.au
We hope you’ll join us on the journey this season. Go Stars!
Regards,
Max Abbott